Adventures of Paul and Karen

I have been busy. Really I have. My Spider Solitaire scores are better than ever – er – I mean, I continue to quilt, bead, and knit.

I made a quilt top and pillowcase for Outreach, and turned them in last month. Since the guild was at a temporary venue, I wasn’t able to hand over some batting I’d been given by a square dance friend. Hannah tested it while Sydney looked on.

I finished Jean’s quilt. I haven’t managed to take a photo of the full quilt yet (hard to find an 80”x80” chunk of space), but here’s Hannah helping with the binding.

The current plan is to drive to Michigan to deliver it in person, after our trip to Mass in June.

I made spring and fall table runners for Mom. She had wanted a double-sided runner, as she is short on storage space, but graciously accepted the pair. Each side was easy enough to make, but there were too many technical difficulties to making it 2-sided. In spite of my efforts, I think one side was larger than the other. Spring called out for a detailed surface design; Fall wanted an overall meander. And in the end, I wasn’t able to balance the thread tension on the machine for the dark green of fall and the light blue of spring not to show on the other side.

I went to the first meeting of a new art quilt mini-group.  We were given a questionnaire, which made me define an art quilt for myself, and look at the projects I wanted to do. All this time I thought I wanted to be an art quilter, but what I really want is to make innovative, original designs. Furthermore, most of what I want to make is identifiable to the viewer, not abstract. However, this process made me think about my “art” UFOs and to get out my “Exercise 4” from Katie Pasquini’s retreat, a project I started about 5 years ago. I enlarged the drawing, and then chose a palette, with help from Hannah.

I then cut out template pieces and fabric.

The next step is to prepare each piece for appliqué. There will also be about fifty very small “potatoes” (many as small as ¼”) in red-orange and yellow-orange scattered throughout the design. These were a real challenge [appliqué or reverse appliqué?] until it popped into my head that I could fuse them on! I may also sew on some beads later – I’ll wait for the piece to tell me.

This abstracted piece started out with a photo of a wooden ladder leading up to a sandstone cave in Bandolier National Park. I think our friend Fannie is in the cave near the top of the ladder. I zoomed in on a small area of the photo, turned the image sideways, and then colored it with a split-complementary palette. [The original beige wood against beige sandstone was a tad boring!] Because the final result becomes abstract, I also added ladder rungs beyond the legs, and more potatoes for color, rather then to realistically show where the dents are in the sandstone. Oh, I can’t wait ‘til it’s done so I see what’s in my mind!

We have a new routine around here. Our water bill literally doubled this month over last month, indicating that we have a leak somewhere. Paul has isolated it to the line between the meter and the house. Unfortunately, that includes two lines that run off into the side yards. Since it has been raining on and off for weeks, and shows no sign of stopping, there is no way to locate the leak by a patch of wet ground or a nice crop of weeds. So he has begun digging up the yard to put in valves to narrow down the location. As for the new routine, he turns off the water at the street every night before we go to bed, and turns it back on just before I get up in the morning. And if I leave the house for more than an hour, he sneaks out and turns it off again. We now keep a pitcher or jug at each sink in the house.

Here’s where the girls decided to sit during a dry spell:

Ooh. Almost forgot. I bought myself a wonderful new chair, an Officemaster PT78. It adjusts in nine – count ‘em nine – different ways. The best part is that it goes up and down with the pull of a lever, good for switching between the computer, the desk, and the sewing machine. [The last time I quilted, I sat on an old Trailer Life directory to get the proper height.] This should reduce the back spasm episodes.

And for those who crave cute cat pix as much as I do, here’s Sydney of an evening lately, on Paul’s side of the couch.

Well, Paul and I both deleted our accounts on Facebook. Our experiment lasted only 6 days. As I tried to leave, Facebook told me all 12 of my friends would miss me. But I doubt it. I felt like my brain was cluttered all the time with the useless information being shown me.

Ravelry, on the other hand still has my interest. I even went so far as to buy a Ravelry T-shirt, which I plan to wear to Stitches West in a couple of weeks.

I did a bit of beading the last couple of days. This afternoon I set my room up for machine quilting again. Now my room is cluttered, but my brain is back to normal.

Some of you are enjoying the Superbowl while I quilt. I heard on the BBC today that the NY Times did a study of Superbowl timing, and concluded that there are only 12 minutes of actual play (movement of men and ball) during the 1-hour game that takes 4 to 4-5 hours to play!

I finished the Triinu Scarf from the book Knitted Lace of Estonia a night or two ago. I tried nupps for the first time – it was less scary than I thought. More on that when I get it blocked. Since my fingers immediately needed something to do, I began a kit I bought up in Alaska, of hand-painted quiviut yarn. It’s soft, like alpaca.

I’m going to teach again! I’ve been invited to teach paper piecing for the guild’s DVQ Day in May. I’ve been putting together a supply list and other documents, and finalizing a contract. Ooh, a contract!

This morning was a little dreary. Hannah didn’t know what to do with herself, so she joined me for a little paperwork.

Since I’m taking a teeny break from quilting, I made these beaded beads from the necklace on the cover of Bead & Button magazine, the October 2009 Issue 93. I just couldn’t wait any longer to see what they looked like in person! They are so gorgeous, with all those eye-catching crystals, that I kept running in to share my progress with Paul.

We’ve been clearing out around here. Last week Paul donated six crates’ worth of books to the library. Paul had checked ahead of time to find out how to donate all those books, many of them encyclopedias, but the librarian apparently failed to tell the people in the back that the books were coming. They hadn’t a clue what to do with all of them or where to put them when we dropped them off. Not our problem now!

In searching for books to donate, I came across my master’s thesis research papers from 1987, along with literature and other articles I found interesting at that time, class notes and study guides from three real estate classes I took 10 years ago, and paperbacks I love but will probably never read again. It was easiest to give away the paperbacks, because I have the librarian’s assurance that I can check them out if I need to visit them again!

I gave away the real estate books and recycled all the notes and study guides – way too outdated!

It’s interesting what I could not part with for so many years. I looked at every page before deciding to give it all up. I finally gave myself permission to throw out all the raw data, graphs, and published papers collected 23 years ago. I don’t even understand it anymore! Then I spent several hours separating a stack of about 5” of paper into what I could use as printer paper, what could be padded as scratch paper, and what was merely recyclable.  Here’s part of that mess:

What I did save was anything I had written in college, including the thesis, a summer research project, and class papers on such topics as nuclear power plants (HTGRs), the solar wind, the civil war, and a painting I saw at the National Cowboy Hall of Fame.

I stepped into the walled garden of Facebook earlier this week. Oy, that can keep one busy! I wanted to keep my network small until I got the hang of it, but decided today to include several generations of relatives, but no actual friends yet. I still don’t know how to post to it, but give me time. Facebook seems most popular with generations that come after mine. My mom isn’t on, and neither are most of my siblings, so I’m not at all convinced it’s a useful way to stay in touch.

Paul tried Facebook first. He doesn’t even have one “friend” yet, but I think he’s ready to close his account! Too busy being retired, you know.

I also recently joined Ravelry, a closed network for knitters. Oh, the gorgeous patterns I have found there, and many are free! What a resource that will be. I think I’ll play in that garden a lot more than in Facebook.

I joined Ravelry because I was trying to find information on a pattern on the cover of a popular magazine. The suggested yarn and needles didn’t seem to match the gauge. On Ravelry I found about 40 knitters who had made the sweater, but none of them had used the heavy yarn suggested! I’m still not ready to make that sweater, because even lighter-weight yarn will cost about $200 – doesn’t seem worth it.

On Dec 14 I finalized with Yvonne the design for the quilt of Mean Jean’s clothing. Since then, I’ve been working quite steadily on the quilt. The fabrics are woven and knit, cotton and polyester, very thin to fairly bulky. They come from shirts, pajamas, a curtain, a hospital gown, and even a pair of Jean’s underwear. They are solids, stripes, plaids, and florals. Taken together, they’re quite a challenge. But I use a cool iron, sharp needles, and a walking foot for construction, to get them all to play nicely together.

The pattern is a simple 4-patch in a square in a square, to showcase the fabrics. The “shirt” fabrics are in the 4-patches and the outer round of triangles. The middle round of triangles is mostly a white-on-white, but the underwear fabric and the white shirts made it into this position in a few of the blocks. Some of the shirts had embroidered or stenciled detail, so a larger square of this decoration replaced the 4-patch in five of the blocks.  Here’s a close-up, showing detail of the blocks after assembly into rows:

The 8” blocks are separated by yellow sashing, and there are 2” posts of the shirt fabrics. There will be a 4” border of blue and yellow floral, which ties in four of the colors in the shirt fabrics. Hannah helped me to cut 9 yards of the floral into border, back and binding strips. She held the larger pieces of yardage on the floor while I ironed.

Here are some photos: The first batch of blocks,

the first draft of the layout,

and the finished center of the top, without borders, but with Paul for scale.

Sydney helped me to layer the quilt. She hunkered down under the back as I spread it out on the floor. I think she was waiting to play “chase her tail”, but I didn’t do my part; I just waited for her to get bored and come out from underneath. Paul then came down to help. He actually helped to stretch out the layers, but was most useful when he encouraged Sydney to nap on his lap with him. Fortunately Hannah was already asleep elsewhere, so I got no muddy footprints on any of the layers so far!

I’ve had to add two extra tables to my studio mess, to support the quilt as I do the machine-quilting. I’m using a soft variegated buttercream thread on top, in a wiggly line, which is less work and prettier than “in-the-ditch”. The quilting will take some time: I take breaks often so my back doesn’t bother me.  Here’s Hannah during one of my breaks:

It has been raining for DAYS, 11 so far. I feel like I should have built my ark by now. Today it is “dry” as promised by the weather folks, but until about 3pm it was still quite cold and gray. Now the sun is finally beginning to show itself, and the cats are venturing outside.

Here are the girls one recent rainy day. Hannah is on Sydney’s sleeping bag, and Sydney’s trying out the pizza box that contains quilt parts.

Party

Tammy’s 50th birthday party was Saturday night, a sit-down dinner at our favorite Thai restaurant.  Wayne did all the planning, and it was a complete surprise, even though there were 26 of us!  It was difficult for Paul and me not to talk about it the last few days, and to get her to the restaurant without suspicion.  It was great fun, with Tammy’s Pilates teachers, the folks she runs with and has breakfast with every Saturday, seven of her quilt shop employees, family members (including Adine and Neil), and a scattering of neighbors whose dogs are best friends with her dogs.  I was brave and went around to say "Hi" to everyone, even those I didn’t know.  Others got there as early as 6:30, we arrived at 7pm, and we didn’t leave the restaurant until about 9:45.  A long, happy night.  [Sydney missed us:  it was a 4-sock night.]

Here are two pictures from the party (that Rich took), when we first walked in and the others all surprised Tammy, and with Tammy opening gifts while we ate dessert.

As his present to her, Paul spent weeks making a video for Tammy. He found a home movie or still photo for almost every one of her 50 years. He added soundtracks of Tammy when she was about 3 and of her grandpa singing and plucking his guitar. He did a fabulous job with the composition, and added a short video of himself at the end, in his orange sweatshirt.

Quilt and Pillowcases

Last week I made an "emergency quilt" for Paul’s grand-niece Alli in Pocatello.  [I didn't know I could find a pattern, buy fabric, and have a quilt completely made in 6 days!].  Alli underwent surgery to correct a problem with a one-way kidney valve. I also made a pillowcase to match Alli’s quilt, and made a pillowcase for her 2-year-old sister, because I think she’s just old enough to get jealous if her sister gets all the presents.

For the quilt top I used the “Take Two” pattern from the charity quilts I do for the guild. For Alli’s taste, I chose a focal fabric of large dogs, and a blue print for the second fabric. For the quilt back, I threw out all color sense and bought this “screamin’ green” fabric. I’m hoping Alli will be as amused by it as I was: the dogs are wearing footwear, like cowboy boots, roller skates and ballet slippers. Here are the top, the back fabric, and the finished pillowcases.

Paul found a small box for me to ship the quilt and pillowcases in. We had to make sure that everything fit in the box:

Knitting

Part of my last order of yarn came in, so I knitted up two more helmet-liners. I mailed in 4 finished ones the same day Patternworks announced an extension to their program. They said the helmet-liner program was such a big success they decided to extend it another month and a half. The cynic in me says they extended it because that’s how long it will take for their back orders to be filled!  I’m still short one ball.

I also knit a blue & purple scarf with purple eyelash. Debbie seemed to like the yarn, so I just whipped this out for her! She has asked for a knit hat with ear flaps for later this year — that will take more thought.

Here’s one last picture of Braxton in his Christmas hat:

And one last picture of the girls, helping me fold the laundry one rainy day. (Hannah’s working on the white T-shirt).

We had a quiet New Year’s Eve, as we always do. At least we were quiet. The neighbors had a party, with live music starting at about 5pm.

For dinner we started into the second Thanksgiving casserole, with chicken, stuffing, wild rice, and pastry. We were a bit late going to bed (10:30pm) because we wanted to see to the end of “Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End”. We had no sooner settled into bed when the neighbors decided they needed to plug in their amplifiers. After that Paul had trouble sleeping and I had trouble concentrating on my book. [I’m currently reading The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger. I’m enjoying the mystery of it, plus the quirks and twists of the concept of time travel.]

At midnight the neighbors’ music stopped, but fireworks went off all over the neighborhood. Hannah bolted off Paul’s legs, awakening him. She skedaddled downstairs. Sydney just waited out the noise. Just when I thought Hannah was settled under the couch for the night, I noticed she was on the cedar chest, looking out her window at the neighbors and their shenanigans. For once, I didn’t hear any gunshots. Ten minutes later all was quiet, and we all finished our “naps”.

Today Paul and I walked down to El Pollo Loco for lunch. Paul goes for walks often, and I joined him today. Eating at EPL is our usual Friday routine and we verified last week that they would be open today. It’s cloudy and a warm 60 degrees today, and at least it didn’t rain while we were out.

I’m throwing caution to the wind and doing laundry today. (Some superstitiously think you can wash your relatives away if you do laundry on New Year’s Day). But I like to enter the year clean, and my hamper happened to be full.

I finished knitting up my 3^rd helmet-liner last night. Have to work on fall-back knitting until my next batch of yarn arrives. I know, I worried about being 5 weeks behind. But the knitting went faster than I thought, so I ordered up more yarn.

I’m making steady progress on Mean Jean’s quilt. (I guess it’s really Yvonne’s quilt.) From each shirt fabric I had cut one block worth of triangles and squares, forgetting that it will take half again as many blocks for the quilt I have planned. I’ve completed 14 of those, but who’s counting? Here’s the first crop:

I’m not currently beading, but I dream of pearls. One of my on-line sources, fusionbeads.com, is having a crystal pearl sale. I would like to make something, but must narrow down many design choices first.

Here are the girls on a rare occasion. Hannah is on Sydney’s regular sleeping place, getting a bath from her sister.  I like the sublime look on Hannah’s face.

I guess I’d better share some Christmas photos before I move on to New Year’s Eve! Paul took these after our Christmas Day dinner, as we were setting up the desserts, and wearing our paper crowns from Debbie’s crackers.

From left to right here are Debbie and me,

Steven, and Tammy helping Braxton with his numbers,

Neil (Adine’s SO), Adine, and Jerry,

and Wayne and Steven.

Ashton was there, too. Sorry we didn’t get his picture.

Here’s Paul working on the first dishwasher-load after all were gone.

Also Debbie sent me these cell-phone pix of Braxton in his new hat.

Poor Mom! She moved to Dallas a year and a half ago to be close to the family there. My little sister was going to have a big get-together Christmas Eve, with all her kids and their significant others, spouses, and children, and Mom. But it snowed near Dallas and the driving was treacherous, so “Christmas was cancelled”.  Mom missed out here and there.

Christmas Day there were eleven of us for what can only be called a feast. We had a big menu planned for dinner, and an even bigger dessert menu. So as we sat to eat I told everyone to save room for dessert.

Paul and Jerry used the new slicer to cut ham, turkey ham, and turkey breast. There were mashed potatoes and boiled sweet potatoes; steamed broccoli and corn; broccoli/cheese casserole and polenta/vegetables; stuffing, gravy, and rolls. We didn’t remember the fruit salad until everyone had eaten “firsts”, so they all scooped up salad with generous helpings of whipped cream. For dessert there was orange-almond torte, chocolate torte, apple pie, mini cream puffs and éclairs, and peppermint and vanilla ice creams. And there was more whipped cream to go on anything/everything.

I’ll never figure out the logistics of a meal larger than 4 people. I’m juggling so many food items that I can never get it all cooked on time, which I guess doesn’t matter because the people don’t show up on time, either! [D, J and S get extra points for being on time.] With all the leaves in our usual table plus a card table in the kitchen, there isn’t room to move around. We had to wait for everyone to fill their plates before anyone could sit! And then I had no seating arrangement: the 2 oldest grown-ups ended up eating at the “Children’s Table”.

The cats were scarce most of the day. Hannah took off early. Sydney came in during dinner and tried to make friends with everyone, and did her best to look cute when we were all gathered in the front room. (Sometimes little B took over the “cute” role.)  I called the girls in and fed them at their regular dinner time, Hannah upstairs away from all the commotion. I thought I locked them in, but had forgotten that my studio door was open, so they just went right back out. When I called them later, the one I thought was Hannah wouldn’t come. I got a flashlight to go track her down and found I was looking at an opossum! No wonder it didn’t come when called!  But Hannah was nearby so I carried her in. She hid under the couch the rest of the evening.

I have to tell you about the orange torte. A while back I read the series of Odd Thomas books by Dean Koontz. Brother Odd had a monkish character (is he friend or foe?) who did lots of baking. One day he made a flourless orange-almond cake with chocolate frosting. This sounded so good I had to have some! I tried Dean Koontz’s web site, and was all over the web looking for a recipe. I found a nice one that I tried this week. I got to know my kitchen appliances really well, and did 2 dishwasher-loads in the process! The main ingredients are puréed poached Clementine oranges, ground blanched almonds, and eggs. I served it with whipped cream and chocolate shavings. [I shaved up a bar of my favorite Trader Joe’s 72% cacao dark chocolate for the occasion.] It was a wonderful combination of flavors and textures. Paul liked the cream puffs better, so he’ll be eating those up and I’ll finish up the torte.

It was nice to visit with family on both sides. Some we had seen recently, some we hadn’t seen in 16 months, and there was one we didn’t know at all who seemed to fit right in. All in all, it was a good day.